Speed Test Sites and Results – 05 Aug 11

Speed Test Sites

A number of people have asked about how to test the speed of their broadband (high speed) Internet connection. The following lists are a few sites that offer a speed test service.

Bell Speed Check - http://206.47.199.107/
Cogeco Speed Test (Burlington, ON) - http://speedtest.cogeco.net
Ontera Speed Test - https://www.ontera.net/myontera/en/bandwidthtest.html
Primus Speed Test(Etobioke, ON) - http://speedtest.primus.ca
Rogers Speed Test - Website link is here
SaskTel Internet Speed Test (Regina, SK) - http://www.sasktel.com/internet/speedtest/index.html
Shaw Speed Test (Sooke, BC) - http://speedtest.shaw.ca
Speed Test Net - http://www.speedtest.net/
Tbaytel Sped Test - http://speedtest.tbaytel.net/
Test My Net - http://testmy.net/
Vianet Speed Test - http://www.vianet.ca/speedtest.php
Videotron Internet Speed Test (Montreal, PQ) - http://testvitesse.videotron.ca/index-en.html

Multi-Speed Test Sites Test

It is important to remember that the results of the speed test only indicate the statistics at the time of the test. It is highly unlikely that the results will be the same the next. To illustrate this point I conducted tests between 11:30 and 12:10 AM on Thursday, 04 Aug 11.

I used a Toshiba laptop with a wireless connection to a Rogers data hub which was receiving a signal by means of an all house antenna connected through a 50 dB amp to an external Yagi aimed at the Bellevue tower. I did three tests as quickly as possible at each test site. Notice the wide range of results both at each site and amongst the sites. You should also note the theoretical best speed for my connection is 7 Mbps download.

Test Site	Ping in ms	Download in Mbps	Upload in Mbps
Bell	N/A*	3.37	1.09
	N/A	3.30	1.85
	N/A	3.14	2.57
Cogeco	N/A	2.40	2.5
	N/A	2.80	1.2
	N/A	2.40	1.5
Ontera	N/A	1.03	N/A
	N/A	1.04	N/A
	N/A	1.07	N/A
Primus	119	1.65	.660
	119	2.01	1.75
	115	2.46	1.83
Rogers	N/A	2.57	3.44
	N/A	2.68	2.36
	N/A	3.03	3.28
SaskTel	N/A	2.14	0.603
	N/A	2.36	0.896
	N/A	2.06	1.1
Shaw	259	2.61	0.68
	250	2.49	0.64
	259	2.52	,490
Speed Test Net	103	2.17	1.15
	104	2.14	0.75
	105	3.59	0.87
Tbaytel	148	2.80	1.8
	145	1.93	1.15
	146	3.75	0.88
Test My Net	N/A	1.7	0.88
	N/A	3.30	**
	N/A	2.0	**
Vianet	N/A	2.54	1.29
	N/A	4.39	1.03
	N/A	2.82	1.65
Videotron	222	1.2	1.07
	108	2.76	0.867
	103	3.01	1.12

* Site does not provide ping times
**Stopped Working

Single Speed Test Site Multi-location

Speed Test Net allows you to pick a specific server for each test. Using this option I tested a few Canadian and US locations. Again there was a large range of results.

Location	Ping in ms	Download in Mbps	Upload in Mbps
Clifton, ON	104	2.87	.92
Kitchener, ON	105	2.60	1.93
Kanata, ON	90	3.02	.92
Montreal, PQ	117	3.65	2.57
Halifax, NS	216	3.42	2.26
Winnipeg, MB	109	3.64	2.20
St. Johns, NL	129	3.68	3.26
Saskatoon, SK	280	1.32	1.33
Yellowknife	168	4.13	1.06
Houston, TX	156	2.90	2.48
Houghton, MI	193	3.76	3.27

North Sault Tbaytel Outlet Situation Clarified – 05 Aug 11

The circumstance surrounding a local Sault Ste Marie Tbaytel outlet is now clarified. 
For business reasons, the authorized Tbaytel dealer in Wawa – The Brick – must be the agent of record for all Tbaytel transactions for service in the North Sault area.
However, the Wawa outlet can use The Brick associate store in Sault Ste. Marie as a “pick-up” point.  This means a user may either contact the Wawa store directly and the items can be picked up in the Sault Ste Marie outlet, or a user may go the local The Brick outlet to place an order or pick-up hardware. The Sault store keeps a number of data hubs available for immediate pick-up and can have handsets, except Apple iPhones, available within 24 hours.
The authorized Wawa agency and consequently the Sault Ste Marie “pick-up” point can only provide hardware that will be “homed” to the Tbaytel network. Therefore the user must have a home or service address that indicates the primary connection to the network will be through a Tbaytel tower.  For all practical purposes, this means the user must live or have business address north of the Sixth Line/ Hwy 17 intersection in the Sault.
All financial aspects will be in accordance with the Tbaytel pricing plans and policies. Details are available at the general Tbaytel website or the 3G/4G HSPA page.
The above does not impact on the ability of Tbaytel hardware to have full access to the Rogers network when the user is away from the primary address.
Sault Ste. Marie
11 WHITE OAK DRIVE EAST
SAULT STE. MARIE, Ontario P6B 4J7
(705) 759-5083 
Wawa
41 BROADWAY AVENUE
WAWA, Ontario P0S 1K0
(705) 856-4252
1-(800) 270-9365
A complete list of Tbaytel agents can be seen here.

CRTC Annual Telecommunications Monitoring Report Covering 2010

The CRTC issued their annual Telecommunications Monitoring Report for 2010 in July 2011. The following extract from the executive summary is published without comment. The full summary is available at this link and the download of the whole report is available at this link.

Telecommunications

Growth in the telecommunications industry was driven by newer services, including broadband Internet services and wireless services.

Broadband Internet

The CRTC’s report found that 77% of the 13.4 million households in Canada had an Internet subscription, with many subscribers preferring higher download speeds. The percentage of households with an Internet connection featuring download speeds of at least 1.5 megabits per second (Mbps) jumped from 62% to 70% in one year. Additionally, subscriptions to Internet download speeds of at least 5 Mbps rose from 44% to 52%.

A broadband Internet connection allows users to stream and download high-quality audiovisual content, and access online government, health and educational services. With an average of 5.5 Mbps, Canada ranked second only to Japan in an international comparison of Internet download speeds.

During 2010, the average residential broadband user downloaded 14.8 gigabytes per month, which is the equivalent of viewing more than 20 movies.

Wireless services

In 2010, advanced wireless networks that support smartphones and other devices that connect to the Internet extended to 97% of the Canadian population. Adoption of wireless services continued to grow as the number of subscribers increased by 8.5% to 25.8 million. This contrasts with the number of subscribers to home telephone services, which decreased by 0.9% to 12.6 million.

New competitors began making inroads in the major Canadian markets, capturing 25% of new subscribers. Although they offered mostly prepaid subscriptions, their competitive presence contributed to a reduction in the average revenue per user from $58.81 to $57.86 per month.

Local North Sault Tbaytel Agency Placed on Hold – 02 Aug 11

Due to unforeseen circumstances, it became necessary to remove the information about The Brick outlet in Sault Ste. Marie selling the Tbaytel Rocket Hub immediately and handsets in September.

We are hopeful there will be a quick and favourable resolution to the problem.

In the meantime, The Brick outlet in Wawa remains a Tbaytel hardware outlet for both the Rocket Hubs and handsets.

Wawa
41 BROADWAY AVENUE
WAWA, Ontario P0S1K0
(705) 856-4252

Echo Bay/Hwy 638 Cell Site Active 26 Jul 11

The new Bell 3G/4G  HSPA became active on the afternoon of 26 Jul 11.
Details about what equipment will work with the site is at the previous blog about the tower.

Goulais (Buttermilk) Canopy Service–22 Jul 11

See this entry for updated information.

Tbaytel continues to experience problems with the Goulais (Buttermilk) Canopy fixed wireless site. At the moment an antenna problem is not allowing the site to transmit or receive the wireless signal at the necessary strength. This problem does not affect the either of the cellular sites – the CDMA (Tbaytel/Bell) or the HSPA (Tbaytel/Rogers). They continue to operate normally.
Unfortunately, due to a clerical error the local Canopy installer was informed the site was operational. On a few occasions, including at my residence, he was unable to receive a strong enough signal and thus could not install the service. I am working with Tbaytel to determine if some user sites require a re-rest. 
For the technically inclined, the receive signal has to be stronger than -80 dBm and preferably in the -75 dBm range.
Tbaytel anticipates it will be 2-3 weeks before they resolve the problem.

Lack of Bell HSPA Coverage in North Algoma

As most readers are aware, the technology used to provide cellular telephone and cellular based broadband (high speed) Internet in the North Sault/North Algoma  area and the whole SSM to TB highway corridor in general is a bit of a mess to say the least with Rogers HSPA only (No GSM) available and Bell CDMA only (no HSPA) available.

I recently wrote to my mid-level management contacts at Bell Canada expressing on behalf of the people of the North Sault area our grave concern with the lack of Bell HSPA coverage in the North Algoma District. [Editorial Comment: Experience has taught me it is often better to discuss problems with middle management personnel who can actually do something than to try and get through the firewall of assistants that usually surround the CEO.]

While Bell acts to improve the coverage in the East Algoma and West Sault areas, as explained in the linked blogs, the north seems to be a bit of a forgotten area in terms of overt activity to improve the service with the sole exception of the Deferral Account roll-out in Goulais River scheduled for 2013.

From other sources, I do know Bell management is looking at the situation in considerable detail and I am optimistic that some form of corrective activity may be in place before the aforementioned Deferral Account program.